City of Gothenburg’s Participatory Budgets 2025

The City of Gothenburg continuously invites residents to help decide how a pool of funds should be used locally—often for social activities that strengthen community, safety, and participation. Everything takes place openly on the Medborgarinflytande Göteborgs Stad platform, operated by Department for Democracy and Citizen Services (Demokrati och medborgarservice) in collaboration with Digidem Lab.

What is a participatory budget?

A participatory budget means that residents are involved in deciding how an allocated sum of money is used in their area. The process usually involves submitting proposals, reviewing them against set criteria, voting, and then implementing the winning ideas. Participatory budgeting originated in Porto Alegre, Brazil, in the late 1980s and has since spread to thousands of cities worldwide, including many Swedish municipalities. The concept is simple: a clearly designated pool of public funds is made available for residents’ decisions. Residents submit proposals, which are cost-assessed and quality-checked against established criteria; residents then vote on their favorites, and the winning proposals are implemented with follow-up and feedback. The outcome is a deeper democracy, greater transparency, and resources directed toward the priorities set by the residents themselves.

Why does Gothenburg run these processes?

The purpose is to give residents real influence, build social cohesion and trust, and allow ideas from the community to become reality where they live and spend their time. The local criteria specifically emphasize social activities that counteract exclusion and increase safety. The results have been positive: in Bästa Biskop 2025, 8,253 people voted—almost twice as many as the previous year—and SEK 1 million was allocated to ten proposals, including an Eid celebration, outdoor cinema, and family excursions.

The City of Gothenburg’s participatory budgets via a new shared platform

Last year, the City of Gothenburg made a strategic investment to strengthen local democracy by providing a shared digital tool for implementing participatory budgets and other participation processes. This initiative resulted in the platform Medborgarinflytande Göteborgs Stad, a tool developed by Digidem Lab and the Department for Democracy and Citizen Services using the open-source platform Decidim.

– The mandate of the Department for Democracy and Citizen Services states that we are to maintain a well-developed infrastructure for local democracy. As part of that infrastructure, we are to provide Decidim as a digital platform, as well as training on how to use it. Each municipal department can then publish and showcase its own processes, with our support, says Åsa Aguayo Åkesson, Planning Officer, City of Gothenburg (Translated quote).

The platform now hosts participatory budgets for several districts, allowing residents to log in, submit proposals, vote on ideas, and follow the processes throughout their different phases.

The City of Gothenburg’s Participatory Budgets 2025 & 2026

In 2025, the City of Gothenburg launched and carried out several participatory budgets. Bästa Biskop 2025 (Hisingen), where voting has concluded, will see ten winning proposals implemented during 2025—including an Eid celebration, outdoor cinema, a traveling pancake café, and excursions for families and youth—with a record participation of 8,253 votes. Keep an eye on the process flow for dates.

The Tillsammans i Sydväst 2025 participatory budget is currently in the “Proposals Become Reality” phase, following the submission period (March–May) and voting (15–30 May). Activities are now being rolled out in the area, such as capoeira training and other leisure activities.

In the Lövgärdet–Gårdsten 2025 participatory budget (Northeast), the process is in the “Winning Proposals Implemented” phase (Autumn 2025–Spring 2026), with SEK 1 million allocated to several social activities, capped at SEK 150,000 per proposal. Activities include, for example, go-karting for youth and swimming classes for mothers, with ongoing registrations.

New processes have also just started: Tillsammans i Sydväst – Participatory Budget 2026, Lövgärdet–Gårdsten-Rannebergen 2026, and Bästa Biskop 2026–2027. We encourage residents in these areas to take the opportunity to submit proposals on how the budgets should be used for activities in their neighborhood.